From the NY Times:
Blacks and Hispanics are less likely than whites to develop melanoma, but when they learn they have it, the skin cancer is often at an advanced stage, a new study of cases in Florida has found.
The study, in The Archives of Dermatology, used data from the Florida Cancer Data System, a statewide cancer registry, to analyze 41,072 cases of melanoma diagnosed from 1990 to 2004. The cases included 39,670 in non-Hispanic whites, 1,148 in Hispanics and 254 in blacks.
While 12 percent of white non-Hispanic patients had advanced cancer by the time they were given a diagnosis, 18 percent of Hispanic patients and 26 percent of black patients were at this later stage, when the cancer had already spread, the study found.
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